Robbery shooting victim is brain-dead

A convenience store owner who was shot Tuesday night in a westside armed robbery was pronounced brain-dead Friday.

Michael Lane was on life support at Memorial Health University Medical Center and was expected to become Savannah's fifth homicide victim of the year.

The city didn't reach five homicides in 2000 until the middle of March.

How to help

Anyone with information on the armed robbery and shooting of Michael Lane at his westside business Tuesday is asked to call Crime Stoppers, anonymously, at 234-2020, or the Savannah police at 232-4141. A reward of up to $2,500 is available for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case.

To deal with the recent rash of violence, Savannah police are reassigning detectives from other units to work on violent crimes, said Lt. Richard Zapal.

Only one arrest has been made in the homicides, although detectives are actively investigating all of them.

Lane, 42, was shot in the back of the head, and another shot grazed his back as he was closing Shady's Discount Gas and Food at Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and West 39th Street.

He was locking the iron gate over the door of the business about 10 p.m. Tuesday when two men approached him and another employee.

The suspects, who didn't speak, opened fire on Lane, who was holding a bag of money from the day's receipts. The other man was not injured.

Detective Robert Gavin, the lead investigator in the case, said he was unsure exactly how much money was taken in the robbery, but on a normal night the store brought in $300-$400 in cash.

Shady's has remained closed since the shooting.

On Friday morning, doctors at Memorial said Lane was clinically brain-dead but still on a ventilator, Gavin said. Lane's family has been with him throughout the week.

While there have not been five homicides in January for several years, it's not unusual to have that many in one month in Savannah.

"Look at last year, we had 8 in 21 days, 6 in 12 days, but then we went 48 days in January and February without any," Zapal said. "There's no predicting to it. There's no pattern to it."

Crime and public safety reporter Paula Reed Ward can be reached at 652-0360 or at paulaw@savannahnow.com.